Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Revkin: "Scientists largely agree that aggressive steps need to be taken to slow and prepare for climate change...wildfires and superstorms are ravaging the nation"; "we must recognize the massive, $60 billion annual health costs associated with burning [coal]"

Scientists largely agree that aggressive steps need to be taken to slow and prepare for climate change. The glaciers in Yosemite are disappearing, wildfires and superstorms are ravaging the nation, and Arctic ice continues to melt at a record-breaking pace...Keystone, for one, would pump only 830,000 barrels of oil from tar sands a day, about a third of the 2.3 million barrels of oil Canada already sends us, and a mere fraction of our heavily subsidized 19-million-barrel-a-day habit.

For those who think cutting coal is too expensive in a recession, we must recognize the massive, $60 billion annual health costs associated with burning this fossil fuel – everything from cardiovascular and respiratory illness to premature death. "You could pension off all the 80,000 workers in the coal industry for a tiny fraction of the medical bills due to burning coal," says Burton Richter, a Nobel laureate in physics.